Provisional Signature Schemes

2. The method defined in claim 1 wherein completing the provisional signature comprises: receiving an index i of the provisional signature; obtaining corresponding values Sig i =Sig((g x i h i c i ,h i )) and h i in response to the index i; and outputting the final signature (Sig((g x i h i c i ,h i )),h i ,m i ,r i ), where m i is the message and r i is the provisional signature.

3. The method defined in claim 1 further comprising verifying the final signature.

4. The method defined in claim 3 wherein verifying the final signature comprises; computing g m i h i r i ; checking VPK(Sig(g x i h i c i ,h i ))=1; and accepting the final signature in responsive to checking VPK(Sig(g x i h i c i ,h i ))=1 occurs.

5. An apparatus comprising: a processor to compute a signature by generating a first value x i using a first secret seed generating a second value c i using a second secret seed, and computing the signature Sig i =Sig((g x i h i c i ,h i )), where g is a generator point, h i is a value derived from g x i , and providing the signature Sig i and h i to a server; the processor to subsequently generate a provisional signature by identifying a third value r i that satisfies the following g m i h i r i =g x i h i c i , where m i is the message, and outputting the third value r i as the provisional signature; and a network interface coupled to the processor to transmit the provisional signature to a server via a network to cause the server to complete the provisional signature and to thereby create a final signature (Sig i , h i , m i , r i ) on the message.

6. A method comprising: receiving and storing, by a processor, a signature Sig i and h i associated with an index i, where Sig i =Sig((g x i h i c i ,h i )), g is a generator point, h i is a value derived from g x i , x i and c i , are generated by a pseudo random number generator (PRG) using two different seeds; subsequently receiving, by the processor, a provisional signature r i on a message m i ; converting the provisional signature into a final signature by receiving the index i of the provisional signature, using the index ito look up corresponding values Sig i and h i , and outputting the final signature (Sig i , h i , m i , r i ); and sending, by the processor, the final signature to a network location.

7. An apparatus comprising: data storage to store a signature Sig i and h i associated with an index i, where Sig i =Sig((g x i h i c i ,h i )), g is a generator point, h i is a value derived from g x i , and c i , are generated by a pseudo random number generator (PRG) using two different seeds; a network interface to receive the signature Sig i and h i for storage and subsequently receive a provisional signature r i on a message m i ; and a processor to convert the provisional signature into a final signature by receiving the index i of the provisional signature; using the index i to look up corresponding values Sig i and h i ; and outputting the final signature (Sig i , h i , m i , r i ), wherein the network interface sends the final signature to a network location.